Steve Jobs was theorethically channeling Picasso when he said ‘Good artists borrow, great artists steal,’ but he may have been onto something. It turns out that creatives are more likely to cheat, according to new research by Francesca Gino and Dan Ariely:
Carmen Nobel via HBS Working Knowledge
Is there a link between creativity and unethical behavior?
There certainly is, according to an article in a forthcoming issue of the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology. In “The Dark Side of Creativity: Original Thinkers Can Be More Dishonest,” the authors report that inherently creative people tend to cheat more than noncreative types. Furthermore, they show that inducing creative behavior tends to induce unethical behavior.
It’s a sobering thought in a corporate culture that champions out-of-the-box thinking.
“In any organization, especially in contexts that are global and very competitive, there is so much focus on trying to be innovative and creative,” says Francesca Gino, an associate professor at Harvard Business School, who wrote the article with Dan Ariely of Duke University. “But is creativity always good? We often hear of cases in which people use innovative behavior to create a sense that what they’re doing is not morally wrong. So, Dan and I started wondering whether there is something about the creative process that triggers dishonest behavior. Specifically, we decided to explore the idea that enhancing the motivation to think outside the box can drive individuals toward more dishonest decisions when facing ethical dilemmas.”
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Overall, the researchers learned, the higher the creativity required for the job, the higher the level of self-reported dishonesty.
Then, through a series of experimental studies, the researchers tested—and largely proved—the theory that creative people are more likely to exhibit unethical behavior when faced with ethical dilemmas.
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“These were simple studies, but they were powerful in showing that our ability to justify things is significantly greater if we are in a creative mindset or when we are creative people,” Gino says.
That said, Gino is quick to add that she and Ariely are not suggesting that companies put the kibosh on innovation in order to keep dishonesty at bay.
“We’re not saying that creativity is bad,” Gino says. “But we are saying that it can lead to problems. And so the question from a manager’s perspective is: How do you get the good outcomes of creativity without triggering the bad outcomes?”
While “The Dark Side of Creativity” doesn’t answer that question directly, Gino hopes that the research will remind innovative organizations not to give short shrift to ethics.
“As a manager, if you’re highlighting the importance of being creative and innovative, it’s important to make sure that you’re stressing the presence of ethics, too,” Gino says. “Dan and I are of the hope that managers will start thinking about how to structure the creative process in such a way that they can keep ethics in check, triggering the good behavior without triggering the bad behavior.”
Perhaps the creatives’ world view involves a relaxation of the ‘principles’ that constrain people with other perspectives? What is they are inseparable? I don’t think you can chase away the devils of creativity without losing the angels, as well.
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